Few months ago there were different ways of earning on the Hive blockchain like Gaming, Blogging, Mining, Trading and other activities alike. And for me all of those were providing me ROI which I was gladly exchanging into HIVE. I was self sufficient on growing my Hive Power and advancing in this vast blockchain by make use of all applications, games or instruments build on top of them. That until few weeks and days ago...
Soon I was to realize that Hive has a much lower return (or even a loss) rather than the communities built on it and all their secondary layer tokens. Communities have their own rewarding systems and instruments which keep your earning coming or staking by getting on different angles. They ensure a passive and active income that once started will continue to give and you just need to repeat it steadily. And with it and with the loyalty of their members, the economics of communities started to flourish.
Some of the communities took a big leap and expanded their horizons outside the HIVE blockchain, a think never heard and never thought before. LEO Finance stepped into the light and opened the path towards cross blockchain rewards through the launch of wrapped LEO on Uniswap and the associated bounties from the Liquidity Pool. Following their path, Splinterlands did the same and they've launched the wrapped DEC on Uniswap with the liquidity providers being rewards with Lands in the game. This kept the liquidity locked down which provided a better price than ever in the history of this communities.
Last we see other communities doing similar things, redirecting Ads revenue to burn tokens, vanish miners which were standing still and expanding through different financial instruments to support them, either within or outside the ecosystem. And if you are involved in different powerful communities probably you have observed that their valuation has boomed.
Seeing the communities revolution and them stepping into the light, I wonder now why anyone would sell their precious tokens back to Hive. I will tell you the truth on how I see things and that I will not convert second layer tokens anymore to Hive. I will still power up Hive that I gain from the posts, but that as a separate goal and just like the dust would fall over my posts. Don't get me wrong, I love Hive and it will be a very long period until I will power down (if ever), but the value now has shifted to communities and there is the place where we need to be.